R3.8 billion pulled from other budgets to hire 3,552 social workers after attacks on women

Government has reprioritised R3.8 billion over the 2027 Medium-Term Expenditure Framework period to appoint 3 552 social workers, Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana told the National Assembly on Wednesday.

Delivering the Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement, Godongwana said the money answers what he described as the recent spate of murders and attacks on women, and gives effect to President Cyril Ramaphosa’s announcement on the unacceptably high levels of gender-based violence and femicide in South Africa.

The same statement sets aside R186 million to strengthen the criminal justice response by increasing forensic and investigative capacity.

On the courts and the care centres, Godongwana said sexual offences courts will expand from 55 to 101, and Thuthuzela Care Centres, which support rape victims, will grow from 72 to 80 by 2028/29.

A further R157.4 million goes to the Department of Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities to improve national coordination and oversight of government’s response to gender-based violence and femicide.

The statement also touches health funding outside the GBVF allocation. Over the MTEF period, R556.7 million will be reprioritised to sustain HIV and AIDS services following the withdrawal of funding from the United States President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. That amount supplements the R3.8 billion reprioritised through the district health programmes grant.

The figures come from SAnews (South African Government News Agency), which published a summary of the statement rather than the full text. The source gives the totals, the court and care centre targets and the departments concerned, but not which budgets the reprioritised money is being moved out of, nor the year-by-year split of the R3.8 billion across the framework period.

The source is at https://www.sanews.gov.za/south-africa/government-reprioritises-r38-billion-protect-women.